Students and faculty nished the 1 season with remarkable performances that brought audiences to their feet. Students were able to express themselves with their instruments through solos, improvisations and ensemble interpretations, as well as band and orchestra repertoire. Excellence in performance is not lucky; it occurs through hard work, close 1 student-to-faculty mentoring and repeated practice. Only then does success emerge.

Birch Creek families, donors, volunteers and concertgoers are the benefactors; we see and hear it happen. Enjoy a glimpse of 1 .

O SENBIRCHUNLIMITED OPPORTUNITIES

Issue No. 62 - Fall 2017

T S M M R F Birch Creek Music Per ormance Center is not only an academy or students to develop their instrumental skills

and per ormance eti ue e, ut it creates opportunity to explore the uture o a career in music

Most students attending the 2017 Percussion & Steel Band session had never played the steel pan. After three days as members of the Birch Creek Steel Band, their skill, con�dence and joy grew with each performance, seen in this lively Panoramic concert on June 29th.

Gillian King returned in 2017 to Birch Creek’s Symphony session for her third consecutive year to study harp under faculty member Faye Seeman.

From the left: Brandon Jaimes, Max Newcomer, Aaron Kaufman Levine and Ryan Robbins perform at a 2017 Jazz I Barnwarmer concert. These smaller combo performances in front of peers and faculty allow for immediate feedback before the evening concert.

Birch Creek Music Performance Center | Egg Harbor | Door County | Wisconsin

This summer was something spectacular. From a Percussion & Steel Band session that opened our season with island fare, followed by concerts featuring Birch Creek faculty and students in a wide array of music genres, audiences experienced the special connections and camaraderie students and faculty have with one another. Percussion & Steel Band audiences danced in the aisles to Caribbean calypso music; later, they were trans�xed while the steel band performed an excerpt from Dvořák‘s moving New World Symphony. In our Symphony session, concertgoers heard breathtaking symphonic pieces as profound as the thinnest thread of sound from our faculty clarinetist, Trevor O’Riordan, which literally moved one’s soul. The Jazz sessions’ faculty and students performed everything from big band barn burners to a delicate bass duet by Je� Campbell and Emiliano Lasansky. They came ready to explore, create, perform and inspire.

Audiences came back again and again, and spread the word in the community and among their friends, creating a ripple e�ect in the county. From one patron: “My sister’s cousin heard the performance Thursday night and told me I had to come!” And from another: “I heard the performance last night, and we had to come back! We love this!” There was a spellbinding moment during the �rst Jazz session when vocalist Katie Ernst sang Moonglow with colleagues Larry Brown, guitar; Je� Campbell, bass; and Mike Lee, tenor sax. It was an impromptu rendezvous. Bandleader Campbell: “Let’s do Moonglow. Do you know Moonglow?” With a wry smile: “In E �at?” Aside from the birds quietly chirping, you could have heard a pin drop in the iconic Dutton Performance Barn. The season ended with an exuberant crowd that left the �nal concert with joy on every face.

These de�ning moments can’t be bottled, but they can be carried forever in our hearts and minds. They represent the unlimited opportunities that Birch Creek so �rmly believes in creating. Students and parents carry these moments home; the opportunities they create de�ne the futures for many students who �rst honed their skills as Birch Creek musicians. Faculty return each year for the opportunity to teach, perform and create the incredible music that binds them together. The same applies to Birch Creek sta�, volunteers, board, donors and concertgoers, where returning each year reconnects them with those who believe in Birch Creek’s mission. I am heartened by and grateful for them all.

I hope you will join us for a concert or two in our Fall Series. And, please, if you were inspired by a performance at Birch Creek, your special gift today will help us create new opportunities for future generations.

Musically yours,

“If we could bottle the Birch Creek experience, we wouldn’t �nd

a container large enough to hold it.”

from t e director mona c ristensen

Percussion & Steel Band: The high energy Steel Band thrilled Birch Creek audiences of all ages, bringing concertgoers to their feet to dance to the music that paid homage to the pan’s Trinidadian roots.

Symphony: Birch Creek clarinet faculty Trevor O’Riordan, principal clarinet of the Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra, enthralled audiences as featured soloist performing Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto in A Major KV 622.

Jazz: Katie Ernst and Larry Brown began the gentle lyrics of Moonglow as the stage lights dimmed in the Dutton Concert Barn and the audience, familiar with this 1933 classic, softly remembered.

opportunities for diverse music traditions and e citin performances

A large amount of gratitude: “We are extremely grateful that our daughter Nalani Bicoy was given the opportunity to play trombone this summer in the Jazz I Session at Birch Creek Music Performance Center. She is a talented young artist. Thanks to Birch Creek’s Play it Forward program, every student receives $2,700 assistance toward tuition.” — Bret Bicoy, Sturgeon Bay, WIJa I student Nalani Bicoy practices prior

to her rst big band concert on July th.

opportunit for families and communities

dult Band Camp charter members perform on ug. . From the right clarinetists

athy Rauch, Chris Beltz and Joel ggert; and Jim Waun, tuba.

adult and camp

Sharing a mission: “I want you to know how profoundly important it was for Pat Sikorovsky, the founder of Bravo Waukegan, and me to visit Birch Creek this summer. Pat and I feel that Bravo Waukegan and Birch Creek are a wonderful match. During Pat’s acceptance speech for a lifetime achievement award from Ravinia Festival, she acknowledged the importance of programs for young musicians, naming Ravinia, Bravo Waukegan and Birch Creek! Thank you for solidifying a relationship between our organizations and shared mission.”

— Karey Walker, CEO Bravo Waukegan, Waukegan, IL

off to colle e

Concerto Competition winner and 1 soloist Maddy Tung is a ending ale this fall.

Symphony SessionAlex Abreu, clarinet (2017), Oberlin College & Conservatory, Oberlin, OH; clarinet performanceDavid Caplan, cello (2016-17), University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; cello performanceRebekah Green, French horn (2016-17), University of Missouri in Kansas City; horn performanceMomo Hasselbring, French horn (2016-17), DePaul University, Chicago, IL; French horn performanceAngie Kein, cello (2015-17), St. Olaf College, North�eld, MN; biology with a pre-med trackAnna Niemoth, piano (2015-17), Nebraska Wesleyan University, Lincoln, NE; piano performanceAnne Pinkerton, oboe (2015 & 17); Oberlin College & Conservatory, Oberlin, OH; oboe performance Spencer Porter, percussion (2017), University of Wisconsin, Madison; business | musicMaddy Tung, bassoon (2016-17), Yale, New Haven, CT; English | music

Percussion & Steel Band SessionTristan Swihart (2016-17), Eastman School of Music, Rochester, NY; percussion performance | �nance

Jazz I SessionKarli Bunn, alto saxophone (2015-17), Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL; music education and jazz studiesMatt Jarosch, trombone (2015-17), DePaul University, Chicago, IL; jazz studies | trombone performance

Jazz II SessionJavier Cisneros, trombone (2015-17), Columbia College, Chicago, IL; jazz studiesJosh Garside-Meyers, drums (2015-17), University of North Texas, Denton, TX; jazz studies-drum set John O�utt, alto saxophone (2016-17), University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; saxophone performanceJulianna Voelker, guitar (2015, Jazz I; 2016-17, Jazz II), University of Oklahoma, Norman; chemistry | music

Birch Creek believes so strongly in the importance of our mission that EVERY student automatically receives program support of $2,705 toward the full cost of their education of $4,805, which serves to �ll the gap between the real cost of a Birch Creek education and the family’s out-of-pocket expenses of $2,100. Please help us with your donation to Birch Creek’s Play it Forward Annual Campaign today.

Patricia Sikorovsky (second from left), Bravo Waukegan’s founder, meets Jazz I students Jason Farias, drums (left); and Andrew Clark, trumpet (center); recipients of scholarships named for her. With them is Karey Walker, Bravo Waukegan’s CEO. They are shown before a Barnburner concert on July 21.

Casey Andrews, Sturgeon Bay, joined the Birch Creek summer sta� as Kitchen Manager in May 2017. He is Food Service Director for Sevastopol Schools, Sturgeon Bay; attended the Culinary Institute of America, and brings to Birch Creek his experience and skills from

his current position and past employment as Chef de Cuisine at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Birch Creek’s mission is to provide intensive, performance-based instruction to promising young musicians by immersing them in a professional, mentoring environment.

Board of TrusTeesSteve Gomoll, PresidentSam Carmen, Vice PresidentCarla Byrnes, SecretarySteve Kase, TreasurerBarbara Flint, Past President

TrusTeesJane BergScott BrunswickRich FredrickJoan GuastaLyn Huber, President, The AssociatesJan JohnsonSteven KaneDavid LongCharlotte LukesDebra Merkle-SchubertMary MosterLolly RatajczakPatti Vickman

adminisTraTive sTaffExecutive Director − Mona ChristensenFacilities − Carl ShakalFinance/Bookkeeping − Ann JohnsonGrants/Development − Kate RerichaMarketing − Emily MaherRegistrar/Office − Michelle Naese

Program direcTorsPercussion & Steel Band − Dan MooreJazz I and II − Jeff CampbellSymphony − Ricardo Castañeda

fall/WinTer office hoursMonday - Thursday | 9am to 4pmFriday | 9am to 2pm and 5pm to 8pm on concert nightsClosed holidays and Dec. 26 - Jan. 1

(920) 868-3763

Birch Notes is published biannually by Birch Creek Music Performance Center, Inc., a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation.

Kate Rericha, Design and Layout. Mona Christensen and Kate Rericha,Content Editors.

Birch Creek is supported in part by the Wisconsin Arts Board with funds from the State of Wisconsin and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Don Makuen died on May 15, 2017 at the age of 86. He and his wife, Nancy, joined the Birch Creek Associates in 1999. Don was Associates’ president for 6 years and served on the Board of Trustees for 3 more years. As a member of the Capital Campaign committee, lent his great voice to the successful $3M project. In 2015 Don received the Associates’ Joan Guasta Distinguished Service Award. A scholarship fund in the Birch Creek Endowment has been established in Don’s and Nancy’s names.

Jill Cavanaugh, 72, of Sturgeon Bay, died at home of cancer in February 2017. Jill’s career as home economics instructor at Sevastopol High School, Sturgeon Bay, was a natural match for her position in Birch Creek’s kitchen during summers for more than ten years, until 2014, warmly greeting sta�, students and faculty.

passin tones

Don Makuen presides as President at an ssociates’ meeting in .

Pictured here representing Main Street Market a ending 1 Opening ight on June , 1 are (from le ) Teri

Madden, Teri Dennis and Radmila Polkhanova.

oin us in t an in our concert sponsors

The Town of Egg Harbor Miriam Erickson Jim & Barbara Flint Joan Guasta Jan & Dick Johnson Steve & Jackie Kane

Main Street Market Marti Thompson MMG Foundation Mary Moster & Lou Williams Nicolet National Bank On Deck Clothing

Roger & Lynn Van Vreede The Shallows Staudenmaier Chiropractic Tannenbaum Holiday Shop Tom & Marlys Regan White Gull Inn Young Automotive

Anonymous Gerry & Jane Berg Birch Creek Associates Birch Creek Board of Trustees Charlotte Lukes Door County Advocate/Magazine Door County Co�ee & Tea Door County Daily News Door County Medical Center Fran Dutton Egg Harbor Business Association

Upcoming Performances

Saturday, September 16th 7:30 PM - Ted Yoder Viral Sensation

Saturday, September 30th 7:30 PM - Scott Burns Quintet

Saturday, October 14th 5:30 PM - A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald

Saturday, December 2 2:30 PM - Family Concert 7 PM - Evening Concert Christmas Around the World

Order ticketsby phone: (920) 868-3763

online: BirchCreek.org/tickets

elcome

Jazz: Some of the most memorable music-making moments are spontaneous, like this one with Jazz I students and guitar faculty, Larry Brown (piano), during an impromptu jam session in Juniper Hall.

Just in time for the Percussion & Steel Band pre-concert show, the rain makes way for a rainbow. Faculty performer Anthony Di Sanza directs.

opportunities of time and place

Symphony students at Birch Creek perform side-by-side with faculty in the 91-piece Birch Creek orchestra conducted by maestro Brian Groner.

Symphony students such as Yildis Rihter, violin, have additional performance opportunities during concert intermissions.

Jovan Williams, Trinidad; Nicholas Venuti, Edgewater, MD; and Connor Foust, Oshkosh, WI bring together culture and distance in their Percussion ensemble performance.

Jonah Roeper, tenor saxophone, performed an improvisation solo in concert with the Jazz II Studio Band directed by Nic Meyer.

The Nancy Andriacchi Named Scholarship was awarded to Momo Hasselbring, French horn, Symphony.

The Birch Creek Associates presented the 2016 Joan Guasta Named Scholarship Award to Yildis Rihter, violin, who was a returning Symphony session student in 2017.

Bravo Waukegan gave two named scholarships in honor of the organization’s founder, Patricia Sikorovsky. Scholarship students were Andrew Clark, trumpet; and Jason Farias, drums, Jazz I.

Don Blanchard Memorial Scholarships were awarded to Elena Galentas, viola, Symphony; and Jazz I students Brandon Jaimes, trombone; and Jonathon Musto, alto saxophone.

Paul & Fran Burton Named Scholarships were awarded to Jonathan Bass, piano, for Symphony and Jazz II sessions.

The Burton Concerto Competition $1,000 prize winners for 2016 returning to the Symphony Session in 2017 were David Caplan, cello; and Maddy Tung, bassoon. In addition to the prize, each won the honor of performing as featured soloists in 2017. David Caplan was also recipient of the Dutton Memorial Scholarship for 2017.

MMG Foundation underwrote twelve named scholarships in 2017. Named for Cynthia Stiehl were scholarships awarded to Percussion & Steel Band students Reheem Assing, Jovon Williams and Tristan Swihart; and Symphony students Isabella Cisneros, �ute; Matthew

oboe; and Jazz II student Adam Hobson, trumpet.

The Sargent Family Foundation awarded Birch Creek a grant for unrestricted support, applied to infrastructure renovations.

The Raibrook Foundation Named Scholarships for Door County students were awarded to Sturgeon Bay students Nalani Bicoy, trombone; and Isabella Dippel, piano. Both attended Jazz I.

Robert Schaupp Named Scholarship recipients were Jazz I students Gage Bachmann and Daniel Brown, bass; Matthew Dardick, alto saxophone; Rufus Parenti, tenor saxophone; and Alejandro Salazar, drums. Jazz II recipients were Daniel Burgess, guitar; and Jasper Kashou, tenor saxophone. Other Schaupp scholars included Symphony students Naama Friedman, piano; and Ben Spicer, violin; and Sylvanus Tetzner, Percussion & Steel Band.

Nancy & Bill Carpenter Named Scholarship for a Milwaukee High School of the Performing Arts student was awarded to Susan Herrera, viola, Symphony.

Egg Harbor Business Association and the Town of Egg Harbor underwrote four free family/community concerts at Birch Creek.

Hatco Corporation has provided Birch Creek with a new belt toaster for the purpose of �eld testing.

For the �fth year, the Les Paul Foundation provided program support for jazz guitar instruction.

Karen Mehigan Named Scholarship was awarded to Daniel King, clarinet, Symphony.

The Kiwanis Club of Northern Door County provided tuition support for Symphony student Noah Laabs, tuba.

Herb Kohl Charities continued their ongoing support with a scholarship grant for Wisconsin student Lizzy Novak, trombone, Jazz I.

Gifts from grantors and Named Scholarship donors provide endless opportunities.

ovations

Hoover, violin; and Esther Whang, bassoon. Scholarships honoring Margaret Miller Gilson were awarded to Annika Strack, Percussion & Steel Band; and Qiao Huang, alto saxophone, Jazz II. Receiving scholarships named for the MMG Foundation were Lain Skow and Rodrigo Villanueva, Percussion & Steel Band; and Symphony students Angela Kein, cello; and Timothy Holman, viola.

John and Carolyn Peterson Charitable Foundation, Inc. of Madison has underwritten Named Scholarships since 2006. Peterson Foundation scholars for 2017 were Symphony students Qiwen (Wendy) Lai, violin; Anna Niemoth, piano; and Guillermo Ulloa,

Reheem Assing (l) and Jovon Williams (r) meet Cynthia Stiehl, for whom their scholarships are named. With them is fellow Trinidadian, Liam Teague, Birch Creek Steel Band Director.

Colin Priller (l) and Alexander Laskowski had the opportunity to meet Bertha Schenker’s son, Ben Schenker, and his wife, Marianne, on campus between rehearsals.

The family of Bertha “Bert” W. Schenker awarded two Named Scholarships in her memory as a recognition of her love for youth symphonies and her gifts to music education. Colin Priller and Alexander Laskowski were 2017 recipients, both viola students in the Symphony session.

The Skinner Family Fund of the Door County Community Foundation continued its annual support of Artists in the Schools, an outreach program for Door County schools.

Roger and Lynn Van Vreede scholarship recipients were Brandon Jaimes, trombone, Jazz I; Jazz II students Naomi Patten, trumpet; and Caleb Otto, trombone; and Symphony students Anna Niemoth, piano; and Leah Zhao, violin.

The Wisconsin Arts Board awarded Birch Creek a grant for operational support. This is the 17th year of support from the Wisconsin Arts Board with funds from the State of Wisconsin and the National Endowment for the Arts.

“Birch Creek has taught me what a career in music can look like, how to prepare for it and how to be successful at it. I loved the experiences I had at Birch Creek!” —Tristan Swihart, Percussion & Steel Band